Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious

Last weekend was Zurifascht, a two and a half day long festival celebrating Zurich that occurs once every three years. Was ist das, you ask? I tried to find the historical significance of the festival, but everything I found online was in German, so I’m just going to be a therapist and tell you, “The festival is whatever you want it to be.” Basically, it’s an opportunity for people to eat and drink for 72 hours. The entire city area around the lake and and around Limmat, one of the rivers in city center, is shut down, and there are hundreds of food and drink stalls and dance clubs on the street. Among other things, the festival also boasts of a gravity defying air show with amazing air stunts done by the navy and choppers. Spectacular fireworks indicate the beginning of the party at night, which doesn’t end until the sun comes up. People spend the weekend walking around and checking out different stalls for food and usually hit at least one “road” bar on their trek. It is estimated that around 2million people are out on the street during the festival. Here are some images to give a better idea of what the festival is all about:



Here's everyone and their uncles out on the street basically all night long:





This was my first ZuriFest and I was determined to make the most of it. My OCD required that I research everything and plan the most fastidious and effective route, but everyone advised me not to “plan” anything and go with the flow. So 12 of us decided to meet on Friday evening and then, you know, flow. The evening started with great promise – we saw a flying dog:



And Ghana looked like they were poised to win the game. However, things started to get crazy once 2 million people made their way to a 1 mile radius area. We started to lose people. At first, it was a person here, a person there. Before we knew it, we were down to a group of 5. Unrelenting, we marched on. Our quest to find the perfect spot to watch the fireworks brought us to the lake shore. The view was indeed great, and the fireworks, synchronized to classical music, were quite spectacular. I would love to show you pictures but I was too lazy to take any good ones, so you'll just have to believe me when I say that the fireworks were fab.

But millions of people in such a small area led to cellphones being jammed and people unable to contact other people. Pretty soon, we lost the remaining people and were down to myself and just another friend. I felt I was on the battlefield and had lost all my soldiers in the fight to survive. Eventually, my one other friend and I were reunited with a few others that we lost earlier in the evening, but by that time, the trauma of losing the remaining soldiers, I mean friends, coupled with my cell phone having no battery, was just too much for me, so I decided to call it a night.

Day two of the festival was all about THE Falafal. In my hunt for my fellow compatriots, the sight of various people eating falafel had not escaped unnoticed. Saturday morning I decided to walk around in the afternoon and try to find my falafel. I had no idea where the falafel eaters had found it the night before, so I painstakingly walked through every single lane and by-lane until success was finally mine. Three hours and a few blisters later, I was united with falafel. Never let it be said that I wouldn’t go to great lengths for things that I believe in.

By Saturday night, I was older and wiser, and having learned from my past mistakes, decided to attend the festival with a much smaller group. And in the process, learned another invaluable life lesson: In a crowd of 2 million, a group larger than 2 people is…large. Needless to say, by the end of the inght, I had again managed to lose everyone, including my visitors from NY. I tried looking for them, but who knew it would be very difficult to find two people in a mob of two million?

Eventually, I gave up and hoped that they reached my place safely. I repeated the post-separation process from the night before, and ran into a few people I knew, but was so exhausted as to be unable to even breathe without my feet crying in pain from all the standing, and had to go back to the apartment and crash.

I had plans for Sunday that included walking around and covering one area that I hadn't yet checked out, going swimming in the lake, and by swimming I mean splashing around on the shore, and of course eating. I couldn't even make it out of the couch and to the balcony. Somehow, I found the inner will to actually move and hunt for food at around dinner time, and left with my visitors to check out festival one last time. I finally realized why this event occurs only once every three years - I don't think I can handle such insanity on a yearly basis!